Posts by Brian Wringer
Too many cooks spoil the campaign
Credit unions are cooperatives, right? The more the merrier. One for all and all for one. People helping people. These are all wonderful philosophies, and they’re the drivers behind the success of credit unions. Everyone contributes, everyone has a voice. But this communal spirit also makes credit union marketing particularly vulnerable to watery, scattered messages,…
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Dear Credit Unions…
Dear Credit Unions, We have to admit, sometimes we don’t know what to make of you. Especially when you look like a bundle of chumps who haven’t been playing the suckers nearly hard enough. Don’t you know you’re missing out on big fat profits? For example: your CU’s Platinum card probably has a perfectly sane rate…
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Basics before buzzwords
Are you feeling a little guilty these days because your credit union doesn’t have an active blog and a loyal audience of thousands following a Twitter feed? Before you start chasing the latest buzzwords, make sure the basics are in place — a useful web site, with current information that’s easy to find. To be…
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Is service really a differentiator?
“Great Service” is often touted by credit unions as a differentiator, but is it really a selling point that makes a difference? Mainly, there’s a problem of credibility. Service claims have simply been worn out from misuse and over-use. And, in most people’s experience, service promises are worthless when put to the test. In fact,…
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Are You Selling Sea Monkeys?
Remember Sea Monkeys? When I was a kid, colorful ads in all the comic books promised you could send for cute, goldfish-sized magical aqua-pals that would hatch instantly, and then frolic entertainingly. Of course, the reality was that you got a packet of brine shrimp eggs. Brine shrimp basically look like hideous little swimming roaches,…
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Were the Pilgrims Illegal Immigrants?
I’ll admit that I had no idea that, until recently, an illegal immigrant could get a taxpayer identification number (but not a social security number), pay taxes, open accounts, and even get a mortgage. And as it turned out, these mortgages performed quite well in financial terms, thanks to conservative lending criteria, fixed rates,…
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What’s Beyond Green?
“Green” is just one type of applied ethics that fits right in to the credit union ethos. After all, credit unions don’t consume all that much energy and goods compared to other types of businesses. But once you’re carbon neutral (or better), then what? What’s beyond green? Clear One of the big trends in business is…
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4:00 am Vampires
I just spent nearly a week in the hospital. I’m fine now, but let’s just say I wouldn’t wish gallstones and pancreatitis on my worst enemy. With an extreme case of boredom setting in, I started musing on the similarities between hospitals and credit unions. Both are large institutions created to make people’s lives better.…
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Your Members Aren’t You
To make an emotional connection with someone, you have to tailor your communication to their wants and needs, not your own. This seems pretty obvious — most people know that they should use simpler language and and talk about “kid stuff” when talking to children, and they probably shouldn’t use swear words around Grandma. But…
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Bet on Emotion, Every Time
Credit union members, like all human beings (including the most logical, hard-nosed, by-the-numbers credit union marketers), make almost all decisions solely with their emotions. That’s not to say that rationality has no role at all — being logical or making the logical choice usually feels pretty good, too. Logic and emotion aren’t opposites. “Logic” and…
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